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It’d been rather quiet since Illya returned to their shared hotel room. He hadn’t looked either Solo or Gaby in the eye and slammed the door to the bedroom.
“Guess his mission could’ve gone better,” Solo said offhandedly.
It wasn’t rare for Illya to go on solo missions. They were always easy ones and quickly finished, mostly for the KGB to make sure he was still loyal and to remind him that even though his current boss was a Brit and he wasn’t behind the Curtain most of the time, he was still theirs. His strings were still very much attached and the puppeteer wasn’t about to cut them anytime soon.
Solo had noticed that Gaby had caught on to this too, and she had looked anxious about the whole ordeal. They all would rather forget their connections and even though their team didn’t have an expiration date just yet, they were still in the midst of an ice cold war where neither side would be waving the white flag in the near future. They all had to say goodbye to each other sooner or later.
Both agents listened quietly, but neither heard any furniture breaking in the adjacent room, so they figured it hadn’t been a complete wreck of a mission and he was probably just tired or something small hadn’t gone his way and he decided to go to bed early.
“I’d have liked to invite our Russian pal, but since he doesn’t seem to be in the mood, how about we go for a drink? We are in Vienna, after all. Lots of lovely sights to see.” Napoleon knew Gaby wasn’t one to pass up a drink, and he always liked spending time with her, so his offer was genuine.
Gaby made a face. “Lovely sights. I know your idea of a lovely sight, and I can tell you I’m not going to play wingman tonight.” Instead of nestling into the fluffy hotel couch, though, she sat up and reached for her shoes. Solo smiled.
“That was not my intention at all. Besides, I don’t need a wingman.” Gaby snorted and he flashed his award-winning smile, but turned it into a kinder one soon after. “I’m not heartless, I need a friend too.”
Gaby turned her head to look at him, her head tilted slightly. Her face was expressionless but he could almost hear the gears in her head turning.
“Fair enough,” she said and stood up to go grab her coat, A Dior, picked out by Illya, of course.
They settled for a small café in the centre of town, not far from their hotel. It was cold, colder than Solo had expected, so they had to forgo the sights and went to the nearest café that looked expensive enough for him.
“Doesn’t it get cold in Berlin, too?” He asked Gaby when he saw her shivering, even though she wore at least three layers of clothing, not counting her thick coat.
She stiffened a bit at the mention of her hometown – they were too close to the Curtain for her liking. Eventually, she relaxed a bit and nodded. “It doesn’t mean I enjoy it.”
“I’ll tell Waverly to send us somewhere more tropical next time,” Solo said before ordering two coffee in perfect German, though his accent still made Gaby cringe as well as smile. Not like she was one to talk. Both her partners had been teaching her Russian and even though Illya never admitted it, her accent was very heavy, butchering nearly every word. Napoleon had made a remark about never expecting to hear a German speak Russian before narrowly avoiding a book thrown at his head and scurrying out of the room.
“Where’d you learn all those languages, anyway?” Gaby asked, resting her head on her hands, her elbows propped up on the table.
“Self-taught, mostly.” He left it at that. How Napoleon of him, Gaby thought.
“I know next to nothing about you,” she huffed. “You’re always playing the secret agent even though you know so much about me.”
“My past isn’t exactly interesting, I’m afraid,” he said.
“Bullshit,” Gaby said, her voice raising. He raised his eyebrows.
“If you insist,” he sighed. It surprised Gaby that he was willing to give in so soon. Did that say something about their relationship? He did refer to her as a friend earlier.
“Born in a rural town in the east but moved to New York at a young age. Our mother ran away from our father and decided the best place to go was New York. Moving to a big city in the middle of the Great Depression wasn’t the best idea in history, though.” He thought for a moment. He hadn’t considered his childhood in a long time. “Raised in a poor family. A sob story, truly. Enlisted at age sixteen for no reason in particular. I liked adventure, but didn’t realize Normandy wasn’t the right kind of adventure for a sixteen-year-old kid. I lied about my age, anyway- told them I was nineteen.” He paused to check if Gaby was still listening. Her eyes were opened wide, completely focused on him. He laughed a little and continued. “Anyway. You know the rest. Returned a criminal, eventually handed over to the CIA.”
“You said “our mother”,” Gaby commented. “Did you have any siblings?”
He looked down at the table, but looked up to see the waitress setting two steaming hot cups of coffee on it. He smiled at her and she smiled back shyly before turning her back to them and hurrying back to the counter.
“I did,” he confirmed, his voice softer, his face turning serious again. “Two older brothers, one younger sister.” He leaned back. “You remind me of her, actually.”
Gaby suddenly became very aware of herself. “Do I really?”
“You do. You’re both extremely stubborn and tell it like it is. I admire that about you both.”
“You say it like you’re not stubborn yourself.” Gaby tried to lighten the mood a little, but he didn’t fall for it.
“I mean it. You allow yourself to feel, even if it is for some simple Russian. I always tiptoe around subjects, joking around to make sure nobody gets to know me.”
“Yet you lay your whole life down on the table like that.”
Solo thought about it and looked out the window. “Guess that’s true as well.”
He’d said it like it was nothing, but Gaby realized this had taken him a lot of effort, since he wasn’t as energetic as before. He was slumped slightly and his expression was weary. Gaby decided to allow him to relax a little.
“What was that about me and a simple Russian?”
He looked at her suddenly and laughed. The mask was back on. “Please, Gabs. The whole world knows except for you two.”
“I’ve noticed for quite a few months, excuse you. It’s dear Peril here who remains in the dark, I’m afraid.” She looked at him as if she knew something he didn’t, and it made her feel like she had some sort of power over him. Mostly because it was usually Solo who knew things she didn’t, and it always irked her.
“Really now? Then I urge you to do something about it because I cannot stand you two tiptoeing around each other for so long. I know you’re a ballerina, but this has got to stop.” He paused and thought about what the both of them had just said. “What are you planning to do about it, anyway? How do you feel about him, about- this,” he made a vague gesture, and Gaby made of it that he was referring to the U.N.C.L.E. situation.
She sighed and rested her head on one hand, using her other to grab the cup of coffee, which was rapidly cooling by now.
“Have you met the man? He’s a damn enigma if you ask me.”
Napoleon scoffed. “I expected more from you, agent Teller. He may be mysterious when it comes to his comrades back in Moscow, but when it comes to you, my dear, he’s as easy to read as the alphabet.”
She considered it for a moment, and swallowed what Solo must’ve thought was her pride. “I might need some help in this.” She didn’t look at him as she asked, but he could see the stoic expression hadn’t left her face. She wasn’t about to blush like a schoolgirl, and Napoleon thought to himself that obviously, Gaby Teller doesn’t do fragile.
“Gladly,” she smiled his widest smile of the evening and Gaby couldn’t help but smile too when she spotted it.
When they got back to the hotel room, Illya sat in his usual chess-playing position. Gaby walked over to him and ignored the look Solo gave her.
“Everything okay?” she asked, trying to hide both the worry and curiosity in her voice.
He hummed a yes and said he just had a headache. “Will be better by morning.”
Gaby clicked her tongue and walked to the cabinets in the bathroom. “I’ll get you an aspirin.”
Both Solo and Gaby expected him to object and say something distinctly Russian. In the half year that they knew Illya, they’d come to learn that apparently, in Russia, illness doesn’t exist and being sick isn’t an option.
Instead, he just looked her way and mumbled a soft “thank you”. Following Gaby’s example, he promptly ignored the knowing look Solo shot him.